Poor Database Design Realities
Steve sees that poor database design is the reality of the world and we have to work around that.
Snake draft sorting in SQL Server, part 3
In part 2 of this series, I showed an example implementation of distributing a long-running workload in parallel, in order to finish faster. In reality, though, this involves more than just restoring databases. And I have significant skew to deal with: one database that is many times larger than all the rest and has a higher growth rate.
Basic Always On Availability Groups in SQL Server Standard
Once Windows Server Failover Clusters have been set up, we can set up Availability Groups in SQL Server. This article will focus on setting up Basic Always-On Availability Groups in SQL Server Standard Edition.
This facilitates High Availability in SQL Server Standard, with three levels of availability and failover:
Asynchronous commit with manual or forced failover,
Synchronous commit with manual or forced failover,
Synchronous commit with automatic failover.
PowerBI premium capacity administration: dataset monitoring and tuning
Over the years Power BI has evolved into a complex and varied ecosystem of tools and solutions, which in its turn demands several supporting roles: there are, of course, developers, data engineers and data scientists, but there is need for one more, i.e. a capacity administrator.
Using AI for the First Draft
What is an AI LLM useful for? Steve thinks a first draft is not a bad way to look at your AI results.
WITspiration - Year 2
A new cohort of WITspiration is strating, the women in technology mentoring circle.
Bridging Snowflake and Azure Data Stack: A Step-by-Step Guide
This article shows how to access Snowflake information from Synapse Analytics.
DBCC CLONEDATABASE is Semi-Discontinued
Microsoft is no longer supporting some uses for DBCC CLONEDATABASE. Read a few of Steve's thoughts on the change.
Who’s Changing the Table? Answers and Discussion
Your challenge for this week was to find out who keeps mangling the contents of the AboutMe column in the Stack Overflow database.
On Being an "Expert"
I had the opportunity last week to present a session at DataSaturdays Stockholm. I can't say enough nice things about the event and the organizers. I presented on Query Store in SQL Server. In my mind, it's an entry-level to middle tier presentation. Most of the room was already working with Query Store, some quite […]
Blogs
The Book of Redgate: Spread across the world
By Steve Jones
This was Redgate in 2010, spread across the globe. First the EU/US Here’s Asia...
Merry Christmas
By John
Today is Christmas and while I do not expect anybody to actual be reading...
Self-Hosting a Photo Server the Whole Family Can Use
By Bert Wagner
Until recently, my family's 90,000+ photos have been hidden away in the depths of...
Forums
UNISTR Escape
Comments posted to this topic are about the item UNISTR Escape
Celebrating Tomorrow
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Celebrating Tomorrow
SQL Art: I Made a Christmas Card In SSMS
Comments posted to this topic are about the item SQL Art: I Made a...
Question of the Day
UNISTR Escape
In SQL Server 2025, I run this command:
SELECT UNISTR('*3041*308A*304C\3068 and good night', '*') as "A Classic";
What is returned? (assume the database has an appropriate collation)
A: 
B: 
C: 
See possible answers